Facebook Isn’t Killing The Christmas Card?

The precipitous drop for Christmas mailings came in the wake of the financial crisis and the near destruction of the global economy, not with rising Facebook penetration rates. The card industry's statistics back that up. The Greeting Card Association estimates that 1.6 billion Christmas cards will be purchased this year, a small increase from last year. A report from the research firm, IBISWorld, anticipates that cards and postage will be the highest they've been in five years — $3.17 billion total. And finally, the card industry's biggest player, Hallmark, has had revenues of around $4.0 billion dollars since the mid-2000s, without much growth or decline.

Second, beyond the physical form of these cards, the spirit of Christmasness, of holidayness only grows more pervasive. No matter what time of the year, people now write contemplative letters with weird formatting to an ill-defined audience of "friends"; these are Christmas letters, whether Santa is coming down the chimney or not.